noé olivas
TIERRA Y CIELO
September 12 - October 17, 2026
OPENING RECEPTION - SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12th 5pm to 8pm.
BEST PRACTICE is very excited to present Tierra y Cielo, a solo exhibition of recent works by Los Angeles-based artist and activist noé olivas. Tierra y Cielo is a meditation on the sociopolitical, environmental, and spiritual realities of the U.S.–Mexico border. Through sculpture, painting, video, and installation, the exhibition reflects on migration, memory, and belonging while calling upon our deepest selves, our ancestors, and the divine for support and guidance.
noé olivas is a multidisciplinary artist, cultural worker, educator, and cofounder of Crenshaw Dairy Mart, a community art space centered on ancestry, abolition, and healing. Raised in a working-class, first-generation Mexican family, olivas grounds his practice in the lived realities of labor, migration, and intergenerational knowledge. Working across sculpture, installation, painting, drawing, printmaking, video, performance, and archival research, he explores what he calls the Poetics of Labor: the socio-political and spiritual dimensions of labor, lineage, and liberation.
Through collaborative and community-based projects, olivas examines the often-invisible labor that sustains everyday life while tracing its circulation between Southern California and the U.S.–Mexico border. Rooted in the Chicanx tradition of Rasquachismo and informed by the Black Assemblage Movement, his work transforms found and everyday materials into acts of collective remembrance, healing, and resistance, asserting that creativity is inseparable from community and that art-making can function as a form of spiritual repair. '
His work has been exhibited at the Los Angeles Law Library, Huntington Beach Art Center, Canada Gallery, Charlie James Gallery, Mandeville Art Gallery at UC San Diego, Candlewood Arts Festival, and Hammer Museum. He is the recipient of grants from the California Community Foundation Fellowship, LA County Department of Arts and Culture's Public Artists in Development (PAiD) program, and LACE Lightning Fund. olivas is Assistant Professor of Art, Media, and Design at California State University San Marcos and received his MFA from the University of Southern California and his BA from the University of San Diego. olivas is an Assistant Professor in the School of Arts - Art, Media, and Design at California State University San Marcos. He received his MFA from University of Southern California and his BA from University of San Diego. www.noeolivas.com @calmatetupedo
Image:
Prayers of Compassion
father’s garden shear, silver metal flakes, iridescent glass, dichroic glass, copper wire, solder 21 7/8 x 4 3/4 x 3 5/8 inches
2024
Courtesy of the artist and Charlie James Gallery
Photography by Yubo Dong, ofstudio
UPCOMING
Jertsin Crosby & Tara Merenda Nelson
curated by Joshua Tonies
November 14 - December 19, 2026
Ghost Agency (Anni Garza Lau + Gro Sarauw)
curated by Doreen Rios
February 13 - March 20, 2027
1955 Julian Avenue
San Diego, CA 92113
map
25th/Commercial on the Orange Line
Barrio Logan on the Blue Line
Gallery hours (during exhibitions):
Tuesday - Sunday
11am - 4pm